ISTOCK, VLADA_Z
Large female fish produce disproportionately more eggs than smaller mothers of the same species do, according to a study published today (May 11) in Science.
After examining the size and number of eggs laid by females from 342 fish species, researchers discovered that in 95 percent of those species, big, old females produced more eggs per kilogram of their body mass. In Atlantic cod (Gadus morhua), for example, the team found that a 30-kilogram female fish spawned more eggs than two 28-kilogram counterparts did combined. The eggs from the larger mothers were also bigger and packed with more calories.
Bigger fish produce “massively more offspring and larger offspring than smaller fish,” study coauthor Dustin Marshall of Monash University tells NPR.
Mark Wuenschel of the National ...
